Wednesday, January 20, 2021

THE ALMOST MONK

 Landing in Sri Lanka is much like a duck landing on a lake. Water sprays from every moving object. The Sinhalese, inhabitants of this floating jungle east of India, adore water; even worship it. Not without good reason. Most times it’s falling out of the sky in shit loads or they are walking ankle-deep in it. Even when it’s not raining it falls from my skin in sheets. I swear, if I stay here too long I will develop webbing between my toes.




Where ever there is water someone is bound to be fishing. Or swimming. Being a small island the sea is never far away, geographically at least. Travelling to the coast is a challenge, even by those who live nearby. Traffic moves at a snail's pace on all roads; narrow, congested and abused as they are. Few people walk more than a block or two unless they are carrying the shopping, a child or a slurry of building material. The heat is almost unbearable, certainly for a white, ageing tourist such as myself. The roads are congested with ‘tut-tuts’ ( a means of transport resembling a milk crate and sounding like my lawnmower), ageing buses and ancient motorbikes. Travelling 100 km could take all day by any of the aforementioned modes. Then again, there’s always a chance of not arriving at all. In spite of the abundance of Buddhists on the road, with their caring and considerate attitude to all life, there is an ever-increasing number of corpses to be found stuck to the bitumen, slaughtered by an on-coming tut-tut, truck or Toyota. 2700 people had the chance of reincarnation this year because of their miscalculation with fate and traffic. Perhaps it is their inalienable right to reincarnation that discourages any sane approach to road safety.



Our driver/tour guide/chauffeur, a good looking and cheerful soul going by the name of ‘Don’, wants to return as a monk in his next life. He started ‘monking’ when he left school. He fell in love shortly after. She had come to the temple to make a food offering. He spotted her in the crowd and pursued her relentlessly. So romantic. After 15 years of marriage, two children and a taste of western beauty he is less sure it was love and more confident with the idea of lust at first sight. 


Don tells me he doesn’t understand his wife. I reassure him that this is not an unusual situation


Don isn’t his real name. It’s his tourist name; for those who fail to get their tongue or patience around his given name: Surendra. There’s a drum roll with the tongue on the ‘dr’.Surendra appreciates the effort we make to get the pronunciation close.


Surendra laughs out loud, like a child among friends, his white teeth contrast strongly against his glistening brown skin. It’s not so hot today.  Moisture hangs heavily from the blackening sky and deposits a layer of softening dew on his skin. There’s a sparkle in his eyes that allows the stranger in me to connect with him. He speaks a Sri Lankan version of English I find easy to interpret. He listens intently, showing discomfort with my language that is typical of one who has English as a second or third language. I can almost hear him translate in his head as he hastens to catch the words and hold on to them long enough to grasp their true meaning. From time to time he squints, a sure sign that his brain makes no sense of the translation he has rendered and shaped in his head. Today he just stares in disbelief at what I have just said. I enjoy challenging him.



In spite of this struggle with words, we manage to communicate with a great deal of ease. I’m surprised at the quality of his thoughts. His understanding of his culture is born from a deep belief that what he is, is what he thinks of his country’s history, religion and culture. 



Yet I crave to know more, beyond his countryman. What of the man who stands before me? What lays beneath the surface? What life has he lived? What has made this young man what he is now?


Surendra has exposed small fragments of his ‘other’ life; the one I choose to know of. The voyeur in me looks hard. I listen for signs of life beneath the tour guide exterior. His mind is like warm wax and his personal thoughts stick firmly as the dust from a long day. From time to time I ask: “what of your family?”, “What of your youth?” and Surendra brushes the dust from the wax ever so slightly. I can smell and taste the thoughts and my appetite is stimulated. I ask myself: What will bring him to raise the broom and loosen the secrets that I crave and he holds so dearly. 


“Tell me of your courtship? How did you meet your wife?.”


He draws in the warm air and seemingly gathers his strength. I make no sound. I must listen. I fear to breathe, least I will shatter the silence he needs. I let him speak without interruption, holding still, letting each word settle. If I am still, perhaps he will not notice my presence. This experience is new to him. He has yet to speak openly of his life, but there is pain that comes with it. He must conquer the pain. No, he must ride with it, as the bird on the wind. He is learning that the anguish is part of him and he must live with it, not fight it, but know it and know it’s placed in his life. His memories of painful times and events are no different to the scars on his lustrous skin or the rounded belly he carries as a consequence of his indulgences. 



Slowly, methodically, carefully, Surendra places his fears where they are safe and speaks more freely of his past. His eyes give way to the yearning to weep for losses and suffering. Moisture gathers and blood rises to the surface as the soft pain in his head pushes his thoughts forward. His moistened eyes look away from me momentarily. He speaks to the warm, thick air. None of this comes naturally. 


Converting thoughts to words isn’t something that any of us can do easily. We fear too much. We fear the permanency that comes with being heard, the misunderstanding that others might gather, the ‘truth’ that some might deny, the ‘lies’ that others might perceive. Surendra’s fears are ‘real’ but often unfounded. He must learn that the thoughts of others are not his responsibility. He can only be in control of his own dread; that which once held him silent in the presence of others. The pain of others is beyond him, out of his reach, out of his field of knowing, distant to any responsibility he feels he must own.



Surendra tells me of his life, at least the parts he is willing to share just now. It is early days. I should not expect too much from him. He is young and still to know the freedom that comes with age. He is yet to know that smart men know of others, wise men know of themself. He will see how his memories grow old with him. They soften as the wax in the summer sun, they change as the dust of years settles and sinks into the softening and malleable wax. The memories will become new, in the ages of time. They will still bring feelings with them but less of the pain and more of the simple joy of living. 


For there is no destiny that holds Surendra to a particular path. His life has not been written beforehand. He is not scripted to perform like a monkey on a chain. His is the creator of his own experiences. Each new event is the consequence of what has gone before. Where he is now is the best possible outcome of all that has gone before. The yin and yan of life give both: rich with poor, sick with good health, friendship with enemies, love with hate, good with bad, happiness with sadness. Surendra is learning to live with both sides of the token of life. He cannot hold the wax solid in the sun. Nor can he see the dust settle and stick. He will live with his truth. And just as we face life, he will face death; his own and that of others, because life and death are sides of the same coin.



As he faces his life, so will he see in his wisdom, that there is no pain that cannot be accompanied by the joy of living. 


Perhaps pain and joy are the same things. Surendra and I are still learning to see how that is so for both of us. For a while, we follow the same path. For a while, we are connected.

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